Ableton Forum

Hi there

Since some time, I experience some random crashes of my Live sets.
I use Live 9.6.7 on a macbook pro 15' mid-2012 with 16Gb RAM and a SSD. My OS is Sierra

Last year (2017), Live was rock solid and was never crashing ! I was on Maverick at this time.

Then, I updated to Sierra and I bought (and started to use intensively) the following plugins : Plugin Alliance Bx_Control and DMG Audio Equick (great EQ by the way).
Then the problems started (I think they were not related to upgrading to Sierra, but I can't be sure).

Sometime my problems happen without using theses plugins, sometime it happens when I'm connected to internet and use Firefox at the same time as Live (so it could be a problem of struggling CPU), sometime the wifi is turned off and Live crashe just by inserting or removing a plugin. It happens with or without external sound card.
While using the same Live sets (just adding and removing stuff), nothing happens during some weeks, and then the problems restart (4 crashes in the last few days for exemple, but any crash during 3 weeks just before - and I'm still working on the same Live sets).
Most of the time, the crashes are linked to some CPU spikes that shouldn't happen (ie that don't happen usually with the same Live set and configuration).

The most mysterious thing is that my wife is using exactly the same set up (same computer, same OS, same plugins etc. etc. - she's composing and I'm mixing), but she doesn't experience all theses random crashes.
She uses much less EQuick and Bx_control, so that could be the point, but she's using them from time to time and when so she doesn't encounter any problem...

I don't use antivirus, my system seems to be clean (I don't have other issues than with Live).

I wanted to isolate the problem, but until now I failed to find any clear clue.

If someone there could help me to read my crash logs it could be a great help : even if it will not give the solution, it could point me in the good direction . I copied almost all the Apple crash logs on txt files.
One question I have about these logs is : are my crashes linked to Ableton Live and audio plugins, or are they linked to a Mac hardware/software problem ?

The logs (in a zip file) can be accessed here : https://www.dropbox.com/s/ykpj96w1eedqf ... s.zip?dl=0

Thanks by advance

You need to contact Ableton support and send them the crash reports.

I did it of course. But until now I didn't have any answer from my numerous emails...

They are slow at the moment but they will reply.

mmm.
I hope so, but I sent 3 or 4 emails in january and they still didn't answer me.
Maybe my crash logs don't show nothing clear to them, or maybe they were overbooked by the release of Live 10...

But I hope they will answer because I don't understand nothing to what happens to me and I hope it's not because of Equick (I love this EQ, but it's clearly a bit unstable with my system, even if I doubt it's the cause of all my problems).

Calagan wrote:mmm.
I hope so, but I sent 3 or 4 emails in january and they still didn't answer me.

That's strange? Not like them, I started at least 3 support tickets during the release of 10, and although slow all of them where dealt with.

Did you receive the usual support ticket confirm?

yep !
"Your crash has been collected by Ableton"
I don't know what to say. Maybe I'll have an answer to my last one...

Did you support@ableton.com or crashes@ableton.com?

crashes@ableton.com
Why ?
Is there a difference ?

AFAIK crashes@ is a sort of repository which feeds into their internal processes. Like the inlet of a large grinding machine.
Support@ is the customer helpdesk.

Although this information might have come from a dream I had. Robert Henke was riding a unicorn and told me about it using lasers. Which makes me suspicious.

Actually I made a bit the same dream last night, but the unicorn was eating large amount of dead computers while playing Mario Kart with Chris Cornell.
I was trying to communicate with them but they completly ignored me...

I guess I'm not a very practical person (some people say I'm completly dumb, but come on I can't believe it), so I should try support@ableton.com instead of crashes@ableton.com if I want an answer.

Thanks for the info...

Yep, use support.

I just received an answer from the Ableton Support.
A very detailed and extensive answer by the way.

It seems I've got some issues with my hard drive (80% full looks too much), with the way I save my files (too much versions into the same project folder - that seems strange to me, because I need to keep daily history of my changes) and the fact I added my desktop to "Places" in the Live browser...
Actually, it looks like the Live file indexer is a sensible point in my problems and must be cared of...

I'll try to solve theses issues and see if it's better...

Thanks to your support in this forum, and respect for the seriousness of Ableton in answering my questions.

Let us know if it gets better.

Interesting that "too many versions in a project" is seen as bad, because I often have +40 .als in a project. Incrementing versions (mysong-001.als, mysong-002.als, etc). And different variations (mysong-002-dub--001)

I guess the indexer struggles with that?!

But it is known that adding your desktop (or entire computer, or drive) as a location can bring the indexer to its knees.